Karagogov Tops Day 1i; Negreanu and Zinno Advance to Day 2
The final starting day of the 2019 World Series of Poker Europe Event #15 €550 Colossus drew the second-biggest field thanks to 628 total entries and that boosted the total field size to 2,738 entries and generated a prize pool of €1,300,550.
Some players already secured a portion of that through the nine starting days but a new payout structure for all 313 Day 1 survivors will be published before the start of Day 2 on Sunday, November 3rd, 2019. Cards will be back in the air at 3 p.m. local time with blinds of 4,000-8,000 and a big blind ante of 8,000. As of Day 2, the level duration also increases to 40 minutes each.
Out of the 628 entries, only 80 players bagged and tagged for the night as Marco Kalchgruber was the last player to forfeit his stack at the end of the night and take home €841 for his efforts.
At the end of level 18 and the final hands for the night it was Yordanov Karagogov that earned the honors of Day 1i chip leader after claiming 616,000 to his name. The Georgian who lives in Prague was one of just two players to accumulate more than half a million in chips as Rudolf Eberle follows in second place with 560,000.
Other notables that advanced through the final flight were Stefan Mital (404,000), Dominique Potenza (395,000), Vladimir Schwarz (372,000), Stefan Raschbauer (359,000), Claudio Di Giacomo (322,000), Jan Ramik (298,000), Bertrand Grospellier (285,000) and Tezer Cetindag (272,000).
It was also the last chance for the 2019 Player of the Year contenders Daniel Negreanu and Anthony Zinno to claim a stack for Day 2. Negreanu had cashed in a previous flight but came up short in the end and would have suffered the same fate again if he had lost the flip with ace-king against the pocket eights of Czech WSOP bracelet winner Lukas Zaskodny. However, a king appeared on the flop and the rail that gathered around the table in the very last hand of the night had reason to celebrate.
Negreanu made it through with 235,000 while Zaskodny put 131,000 in his bag. Zinno also made it through with 261,000 and keeps his slim chances of the 2019 POY title alive. Shaun Deeb and Robert Campbell had bagged in the previous flight and all eyes will be on the "fantastic four" in the final tournament of the 2019 WSOPE in Europe's biggest poker arena at the King's Resort in Rozvadov.
Among those to bust throughout the last starting day were such familiar names as Anson Tsang, Manuel Blaschke, Konstantinos Tsirakidis, Matous Skorepa, Elena Litvinyuk, Remi Wyrzykiewicz, Maria Lampropulos, Dorde Jovanovic and Tomas Ribeiro to name just a few.
Lampropulos saw her hopes of Day 2 vanish when she ran with kings into the pocket aces of Walter Pflueger. While a king appeared on the turn, a ten on the river restored the preflop order and improved Pflueger to the ace-high straight. Close to the money bubble on the very same table, Yaniv Kaldaron turned a wheel but Efstathios Komitas rivered a full house.
In the final level of the night the money bubble burst when Shay Aldorf and Eli Molina were eliminated on different tables with the former coming up short in a set-over-set clash with Stefan Mital. Once the bubble burst, more than a dozen players were sent to the payout desk including Roberto Manfredi, Sebastien Soardi, and Petr Mifek.
Day 1i Payouts
| Place | Winner | Country | Prize (in EUR) | Prize (in USD) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 81 | Marco Kalchgruber | Germany | €841 | €934 |
| 82 | Christoph Merten | Germany | €805 | €894 |
| 83 | Amit Gibel | Israel | €805 | €894 |
| 84 | Sebastien Soardi | France | €805 | €894 |
| 85 | Petr Mifek | Czech Republic | €805 | €894 |
| 86 | Igor Salimovic | Serbia | €805 | €894 |
| 87 | Rinat Tulepbergenov | Kazakhstan | €805 | €894 |
| 88 | Leif Petersen | Netherlands | €805 | €894 |
| 89 | Marek Sulc | Czech Republic | €805 | €894 |
| 90 | Roberto Manfredi | Italy | €805 | €894 |
| 91 | Falko Koehnke | Germany | €789 | €876 |
| 92 | Bruno Englebert | Belgium | €789 | €876 |
| 93 | Guenter Jakwerth | Austria | €789 | €876 |
| 94 | Ehud Salomon | Israel | €789 | €876 |
| 95 | Somphong Daoheuang | Germany | €789 | €876 |
All Day 1 survivors combine to a single field for the first time and return to the tables at 3 p.m. local time in order to get one step closer to the coveted gold bracelet on the penultimate day of the festival in Rozvadov. PokerNews will be your one-stop-shop for all the action.
